Pakistan Mall Blaze Kills at Least 26, Scores Missing
dpa
(TNS)
Islamabad — Hundreds of rescue workers backed by heavy machines were on Monday drilling through the rubble of a collapsed mall compound in southern Pakistan to find scores missing after a massive fire that killed 26 people, officials said.
The blaze erupted at a multi-storey shopping mall in the city of Karachi late on Saturday night, entrapping dozens of shopkeepers and shoppers inside the compound which did not have planned emergency exits, local rescue spokesman Hassanul Haseeb Khan said.
At least 26 bodies have been retrieved in the rescue operation that started after the fire was put out several hours later, Khan added.
More than 70 people were still feared trapped under the rubble, regional government spokeswoman Sadia Javed said, as rescue workers continued a floor-by-floor search to locate survivors.
"It looks a race against time. We still hope to find some people alive," said Murad Shah, chief minister of the province of Sindh.
Hundreds of relatives of the missing were camped outside the building, some of them crying and wailing as rescue workers continued to find bodies one after the other.
"These are painful moments of waiting for a miracle," a middle-aged man told Pakistani broadcaster Geo News, as he waited to know about his son who had a shop in the mall.
Nearly 50 people were wounded in the incident, and there was a fear that the death toll could rise further.
Javed said that mobile phone location tracking showed that at least 45 people reported missing by their families were traced to the shopping mall.
The shopping mall was approved for 400 shops but was crammed with around 1,200, many stocked with clothes, cosmetics, electrical appliances and chemicals.
"Only two out of the seven exit points of the mall were operational," she said.
Rescue spokesman Khan said teams were using electric scanners to find survivors and the bodies of the dead. Two floors had been searched so far, he added.
Fires in residential and commercial buildings are frequent in Pakistan, where many high-rises operate without certified fire and safety systems.
Fire departments are often understaffed and poorly equipped, limiting their ability to respond to large-scale emergencies.
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